Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Stuff I Do Not Need To Know

I am (until they add the other guy) the only person in the Security group at work. Well, my Security group, anyway.
There are a lot of other groups in charge of a lot of other security-related things.
In order to make sure I have the information I need for my entirely new role, I was given access to a lot of stuff when I signed on. Just in case.
I get virus advisories (not my thing), tips about workplace safety (also not me), requests for network access (so not my area), and the forms people submit when they want to administer their own workstations. This isn't my job, either, but I still get the emails about it.
Most of the time, users are given "user" rights so they can't break the computer of hurt themselves.
Some users (like I.T. people) need to be able to make changes in order to do their jobs, and this always results in the generation of one of these web forms which gets emailed to me for review and inaction.
I skip over all the "computer name" and "user" and "role" stuff and scan right for the "reason administrative rights are required".
Sometimes those are priceless!
One time, someone wanted to store their MP3s on their workstation as if they can't just stash hundreds of gigs of pirated media on one of the file servers like the rest of us.
Another time someone wanted to bypass the internet filtering to view non-work-related web pages instead of just putting in the proxy server information for the unfiltered 'net like everyone else.
On Tuesday, my favorite so far arrived in my Inbox.
Someone needs administrative rights to update a certain software license on an "anal basis". I'm not sure that function requires administrative access, but it most certainly requires a mature relationship with one's workstation. I'm also fairly certain it violates the spirit of some of our HR guidelines, if not the letter.
The email was very quickly recalled by the sender to be replaced by a corrected form.
It seems the original had contained the wrong computer name.
The "basis" in question was correct enough to be included in the re-send.

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